The S&P 500 fell by as much as almost 2% on Monday, as Facebook and other tech names tanked. Facebook had fallen as much as 8% at the market low and was down 7% at 2 pm after reports that Cambridge Analytica had improperly retained profile information for millions of users.
The tech sector as a whole lost heavily, with Google and Qualcomm both down by as much as 4%, followed by Gilead Sciences and Apple, falling by as much as 3.7% and 2%, respectively.
The big market move didn’t appear motivated by fear of rising bond yields in the advent of tomorrow’s Federal Reserve meeting; US bond yields were largely unchanged. Nor was it provoked by fears of trade war. The US name most exposed to trade war retaliation, Boeing, was one of the top three performers in the Dow Jones Industrial Index. The repricing of the tech sector appears to reflect investor caution about growth estimates.